Executive Flight

Whatever reasons the U.S. may have had for entering Viet Nam, commercial exploitation was hardly among them. Although the American business community in Saigon has grown roughly 20% since the 1973 Paris accords, to about 230 members, the total U.S. investment in Nguyen Van Thieu's crumbling nation still amounts to a paltry $25 million--or about the cost of half a day of the war at its height. Skeptical of Thieu's ability to govern and frightened by the country's runaway inflation, U.S. multinational corporations have never been willing to risk large amounts of capital in Viet Nam--even though the Saigon government set up the Industrial Development Bank to solicit foreign investment and announced grandiose plans to erect industrial parks, hotels with convention centers and even a Vietnamese Disneyland.

In less than a month, the Disneyland-ish dream of building a capitalistic Viet Nam with American business know-how and money has turned into a nightmare. Last week, as fears of reprisals from embittered South Vietnamese swept through the chaotic capital and Communist forces regrouped an hour's drive to the northeast for an assault that could overrun Saigon, most of Viet Nam's American executives were either gone or packing to leave. Said one businessman: "It's almost better to go home now and come back to make a better deal with a Communist regime in five years."

Two U.S. oil companies drilling offshore in the South China Sea shut down their rigs and evacuated American personnel in company planes. Some members of an oil-company rigging crew may have headed straight for Singapore in their workboat. Local branch managers for Chase Manhattan, First National City and Bank of America chartered a Pan Am 707 and flew to Hong Kong for "consultations" despite U.S. embassy protests that their departure was premature. In fact, it was ordered by then-head offices. Said B. of A. Vice President Andrew Boudewyn in San Francisco: "We wanted to evacuate them before we had to do it in coffins."

Getaway Plans. Defying the odds, a few American companies continue to operate in Saigon. Among them: San Francisco-based Foremost-McKesson, which runs the capital's only dairy. Foremost will keep the plant running, said President William Morison, "as long as whatever government they have there allows us to." Chase's branch manager returned to Saigon, at least temporarily, after embassy officials promised that he and other bank employees would have equal priority with government personnel if and when it came time to run. Pan American last week managed to operate two scheduled flights into Saigon, even though the airline said that its Tan Son Nhut airport personnel were "trying to rush hundreds of passengers aboard airplanes" and "coping with bayonet-carrying MPs." Thursday's 373-seat Pan Am 747 flight, however, left with only 170 passengers aboard. One reason: some of the remaining Americans were making getaway plans and then postponing them. Explained one U.S. executive: "I'm afraid of the panic among the employees that might happen if I left."

U.S.-headquartered managements, however, may soon force most of those who have stayed to evacuate and turn over local operations to Vietnamese assistants, many of whom cannot get exit Visas. The Saigonese already abandoned by their American managers are philosophical about their sudden move into the executive suite. One caretaker told TIME Correspondent William McWhirter: "As a foreigner, your country is over there. Why lose your life over here? It's better to let a national do the job for a while." Judging by the week's events in Viet Nam, that could be a short while indeed.

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